Villain Talk

13Sep

How do you create the antagonists for your stories?

On one of my latest drafts of a story, I’m realizing that the antagonist spends most of her time hiding in the background. There’s one, maybe two, scenes that actually give readers a peek as to who she is and what she’s doing… I mean, I know what she’s doing and why she’s doing it, so I guess that’s a good thing as the writer.

Not many antagonists these days are villains just for the fun of it (although that would be an interesting challenge, wouldn’t it?). They need motivations just as the protagonists do, while probably also believing that they are in the right. Generally, they are seen as the foil to the protagonist, the opposite in ideals and actions. Alternatively, they could be seen as very similar to the protagonist — had the protagonist made one small change, taken a different road just that one time, and they themselves may have turned into the antagonist.

So how do villains crop up in your stories? Do you start with the protagonist and figure out how to best create someone to oppose them? Or maybe you start off with the problematic child and craft your hero around them? Maybe one of your protagonist’s best friends just happens to naturally evolve into the antagonist, or your protagonist themselves become their own worst enemy.

It’s definitely an interesting process, and it makes me wonder what’s up with my brain for creating such characters…

4 responses to “Villain Talk”

Two of my favorite villains to write about were because of circumstances they were thrown into. In “Puck’s Choice”, Warren blames Puck for his newfound condition as a shifter (he hates animals), and seeks revenge rather than learning to deal with his condition.

On the same token, there’s Jrengen, a human dragged into a fantasy world where he’s told he has magical abilities, and as such will receive a dragon. Exciting, right? Except for he was quite the victim of circumstance and brought to the fantasy world completely on accident, doesn’t have magic, and won’t bond with a dragon because of it. Revenge? Steal a dragon hatchling and kill bonded dragons and riders alike while blaming them for his being within a magical world he was told he’d fit into better than the modern human world.

Neither villain gets a lot of screen time, but I always know what they’re doing behind the curtain. In fact, Warren will be getting his own novella that will coincide with “Puck’s Choice” and show everything he went through from the time he became a shifter until the time he was defeated, which I find utterly exciting.